The present invention relates in general to a computer-based method and apparatus for assisting multiple parties involved in complex negotiations in reaching an agreement that optimizes the individual and overall benefit to the parties.
Negotiation is a process where two or more parties with conflicting objectives attempt to reach an agreement. This process includes not only bargaining--the presentation and exchange of proposals for addressing particular issues--but also the attempts by each party to discover and use knowledge of the preferences, strengths and weaknesses of their opponents to reach a mutually acceptable resolution. Negotiating parties may be individuals or teams representing their own interests or the interests of their organizations. When there is at least some willingness to engage in negotiation, it can be a constructive alternative to other means (e.g., violence, litigation, stalemate) of settling disputes.
The main purpose of a negotiator is to try to identify alternatives that all parties in conflict will find acceptable. Negotiators must identify and explore the impacts of various decisions, and begin to understand the tradeoffs among these impacts. They should determine, for each proposed solution to the conflict, what each party will get, and what they will have to give up, and whether or not what they get will be worth more than what they will lose.
A third party mediator or facilitator may be included in a negotiation process to help manage the interactions and make suggestions for negotiating parties to consider. Alternatively, an arbitrator may be involved with the power to draft and perhaps dictate settlements for the parties. It is commonly recognized that such disinterested parties can significantly help negotiators in their quest for an agreement.
Recent developments in modeling negotiation processes is motivating work in the use of computer-based analyses of negotiation problems. The complexity of negotiation problems is a challenge. However, computer models today are able to address many of these problems with increasing effectiveness once the issues and stake-holders (those who are in conflict or who will be affected by any agreement) are adequately defined. Any analysis of negotiation problems must permit the updating of issues, preferences, and interested stake-holders as the negotiation process proceeds. This analysis must also include the ability to generate enough information so as not to constrain or limit the options and thinking of those negotiating, yet not overload them with information that may divert or distract them from reaching some mutually satisfactory agreement.
The current literature on interactive computer programs for multi-objective conflict resolution commonly uses the term Negotiation Support System. This term refers to the special type of group decision support system designed for providing assistance in situations where there is disagreement and conflict among various parties as to what decisions to adopt. Research addressing group decision making in multi-objective situations is in its second decade, yet the development and use of Negotiation Support Systems to facilitate and help guide multi-party negotiations is a relatively new field.
Negotiation Support Systems can be categorized according to their functions either as negotiation preparation systems supporting a pre-negotiation strategic planning stage, or negotiation information management systems facilitating negotiations in real time. Negotiation information management systems can be further classified as either context support systems or process support systems. Context models focus on the behavior of the system being designed, managed or operated. Such models are used to answer questions about the performance of the system given any particular decision regarding its design, management or operation. Process models are concerned with the dynamics or procedure of the negotiation process that includes how a group of parties with differing and conflicting objectives can reach an acceptable agreement.
Numerous efforts are underway in each of the various kinds of Negotiation Support Systems described above. Of particular interest are process support systems. These systems are designed to provide a practical means of increasing the likelihood of mutually agreeable settlements when a potential region of agreement exists. Sometimes they can help identify better solutions than would have been found without their use.
The majority of process support systems described in the literature are still in the conceptual stage or are, at best, a "backroom processor" playing a relatively passive role in the negotiation process. Most working systems are single workstations that support a professional mediator rather than the negotiating parties directly. Further work is needed before these models can substantially aid negotiating parties in a complex real-world setting.
These prior art process support systems employ different approaches for generating alternative solutions for multi-objective conflicts involving multiple parties and multiple issues. Two such approaches treat the conflict as a multi-objective optimization problem. These two approaches are discussed in Loucks et al., "Water Resource Systems Planning and Analysis", 1981 and are known as the weighting and constraint methods. With the weighting method, each objective (e.g., maximization of a certain party's satisfaction) is assigned a weight in the overall maximization of total satisfaction in order to generate a single alternative on what is known in the art as the efficiency frontier. The efficiency frontier is defined by Pareto to be a satisfaction tradeoff function which represents the upper boundary of all feasible alternatives and thus defines a set of agreements which provides the maximum overall satisfaction that can be achieved by the parties in the negotiation. The principle disadvantage of the weighting approach is that it cannot generate the complete set of efficient agreements unless the efficiency frontier is defined by a strictly convex curve.
The constraint method maximizes a particular party's satisfaction subject to constraints on other party's satisfaction. This method is better than the weighting method at generating the entire set of efficient agreements, but can also generate inferior solutions along flat or negatively sloped portions of the production-possibility frontier. By its nature, the constraint method cuts off a portion of the set of feasible solutions and is therefore not suitable for generating a single alternative solution.
It is evident that decision makers could benefit from improved tools to assist them in making favorable decisions, especially when confronted with conflicting objectives and demands. More rigorous research is needed on the role computers can play in helping groups make decisions and resolve conflicts, and on the impact computers have on the process outcomes as well as on the participants' attitudes. The ultimate objective is to offer negotiating parties a means by which they, or a third party facilitator, could directly define and evaluate possible settlements that would result in mutual gains for negotiating parties. Achieving this objective would be a significant step toward improving the efficiency and effectiveness of the negotiation process.